


Lost in the Fields

by flamethrower



Series: Field, Garden, Oasis [1]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: Jedi Apprentice Series - Jude Watson & Dave Wolverton
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, GFY, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-27
Updated: 2012-08-27
Packaged: 2017-11-12 23:41:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 863
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/496974
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flamethrower/pseuds/flamethrower
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Obi-Wan Kenobi gains a Master, only to lose him to harsh circumstances.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lost in the Fields

They sent him to the fields, at first.  They needed help there more than anywhere else, and hoped that his rumored delicate touch in the Force would help the plants to grow.  He tried his best, but the bleak desolation in his heart turned vibrant leaves dull and brown, and made the plants heavy with fruit bow down, unable to bear their own weight any longer.

The Masters in the Corps looked at the too-thin boy with unruly red hair and calm, accepting eyes, and decided to try again, for they sensed no ill-intent within him, and no more sadness than any other Initiate-turned-Corps worker.  After all, the Council only sent the ones here who would adapt to the life.  Given time, the sadness would leave. 

But the plants saw more than the Masters knew to look for.

They sent him out with crews to work on distant planets, to prune and care for the meditation gardens that were created for respite, open to all souls who needed soothing.  His soul was not soothed, though he appreciated the soft whispers he could hear; the Force was amplified in those places, touching even those who could not reach back. 

He tried not to work on the plants, and found a brief moment of peace among the rocks, carrying and laying stones of all colors to encircle the flowerbeds.  The stones didn't judge.  The stones could withstand everything.

Then someone made him use a sledgehammer on the great stones to turn them into small things, ready to be scattered across the ground, and his heart retreated.  The stones were not strong enough, after all. 

He went back to the plants and found a great, rambling rose that needed pruning, and each cut of the shears made him feel as if he were slicing off his own limbs.  When the Master in charge of their group sought him out some hours later, he found the child kneeling on the ground, jaw clenched, dry-eyed, the shears cast off into the bushes.  

The rose did not wilt, but it would not ever thrive again.

The Master considered things, puzzled.  When he took his charges to Mon Calamari, he sent the red-headed child with the Quarren and Mon Calamari workers to tend to the living corals that grew just beneath the surface of the planet's clear waters.  The boy's eyes were gray as he walked in the shallow waters among them, and before evening the corals were thrumming in the water, sending up a pulse of grief that made the Quarren wince and the Mon Calamari sing tales of ancient losses.

"Force's sake, child," one of the Quarren said, taking the boy aside and speaking to him, her hands like gentle weights on his shoulders.  "You need to go home."

The boy looked up at her with luminous eyes and said in a soft whisper, "My home went away."

The old Quarren woman escorted him back to the AgriCorps Master as the stars began to appear overhead.  She talked to the old man for a few moments, while the child watched the bright points of light, paying little attention to what they were saying. 

He was waiting with a Jedi's patience for the next task, the next goal.  He could not stop being a Jedi, even when it was clear that it was something he would never be.  He had fought for the destiny that sang in his blood, but when the chance had gone, the singing had not stopped.  Where once that song had filled him with warmth, it now left him bereft, for the song was of the Force—and the Force was lying to him.

They returned to Bandomeer, and the sight of the planet from the ship’s viewscreen made him clench his hands into fists, his fingers working to remove dirt that didn’t exist from beneath his fingernails.  That phantom feeling of earth would not leave him, made him feel like he had dug the grave with his hands instead of the spade the Corps had helpfully provided.  Most Jedi were burned upon pyres, but the man who had wanted to be his Master (who had wanted _him_ ) was an odd sort.  The boy had buried him beneath the ground, the body a gift to the plants the boy couldn’t care for.

At least one of them was capable of doing the job the Council had assigned to him.

The ship landed, and the gaggle of laughing teenagers and adults moved down the exit ramp like a flock of cheerful, happy birds.  They had invited the boy to join them, but he had refused with distant politeness.  He didn’t want their home; it wasn’t the _right_ home.

Time would pass, as time did, and with luck perhaps the Corps would be done with him, would send him to his father.  Tatooine was nothing to love, but it had to be better than dwelling here, watching his hands bring death when all he wanted was for death to come to him. 

Obi-Wan Kenobi looked up at the stars and resumed waiting, and even the Force grew silent, unable to sing against the pervading echoes of loss.


End file.
